Visionary Picks In Alignment with the style of The Unfortunate Marriage: Cult Guide

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

Spoiled, lazy Harold Chester Winthrop Gordon finds that he has been disinherited, barred from seeing his sweetheart, and expelled from his club. He decides to reform himself and begins by crossing out his first three names with an "x." Thereafter known as "Three X Gordon," he says goodbye to pretty Dorrie Webster and sets out with his friend Archie for the West. Because they are penniless, however, they get only as far as a New Jersey town, where they become farmhands. Shocked at first by the long hours and hard labor, Three X and Archie soon find the work so physically and morally beneficial that they decide to establish a farm for the regeneration of millionaires' sons. The plan is a success, and Three X even makes a man of Dorrie's lazy brother. With the declaration of World War I, Three X proudly leads his clients into his country's service, promising to return to Dorrie.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of War and the Woman perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

After learning that her stepfather, John Braun, is a spy, Ruth leaves him and starts out upon a cross-country journey. In her travels, she sees a plane crash to earth and rushes to assist its pilot, John Barker. The two fall in love and are married. In the midst of their honeymoon, war breaks out and John is called to his post, leaving Ruth alone with only the servants to protect her. In John's absence, the enemy invades the countryside, commandeers the Barker house and imprisons Ruth in her room. Meanwhile, John takes leave to search for his wife. Managing to get through the enemy line, he arrives just as Ruth, enraged at the action of the invaders, dynamites the cellar of the house. As the building explodes, Ruth and John escape in his plane.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

Lear is an old man blind to his weaknesses. He decides to divide his kingdom among his three daughters according to who recites the best declaration of love. Goneril and Regan pretend to love him but treat him cruelly. Cordelia is loyal but, confusing honesty with insolence, he disowns her.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of King Lear perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Sylvia Leigh's only recollection of her father was a dim memory of a distinguished-looking man who brought her to boarding school when she was a youngster. From that time he never came to see her, but letters came from him with foreign postmarks stating that "important business" kept him away. After her graduation an old family servant took her to the home she had never known. Within a few months her father appeared. Not the parent she had pictured, but a broken old man whose mind seemed ham ted by some shadow from the past. One day while they were motoring in the park he suddenly drew a revolver, and aiming it at a passing auto, exclaimed, "That man wrecked my life." But before he could pull the trigger he fell exhausted from the effort and the other car passed before Sylvia saw his face. Her father became seriously ill from the excitement. On his deathbed he made her promise to run to earth the man who ruined his life. With no clues or an inkling of what the secret was, she attempted to locate him by an ad in the papers, only to fall into a trap. A roughly-clad young man came to her rescue. Some weeks later she was surprised to find this same young man as a guest at a dance given by a girlfriend. But this time he was clad in evening dress and perfectly at home among society. Then came the blow. An incident revealed him to her as the man she had vowed to bring to atonement. She shadowed him, caught him in a compromising position, kept him captive and phoned the police. Then the fact that she still loved him rushed over her. She realized also that her father's secret was still a mystery. What will he do? Keep a deathbed promise and turn him over to the law or obey her heart? Love wins out. As a knock comes on the door she tells him she still loves him and to escape. But he only smiles, opens the door to the officers, who greet him familiarly, and then he make some remarkable disclosures to Sylvia, which brings happiness to her troubled heart.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

John Benton is the head of a company that makes parts for ships. He is a fair and honorable man, but his partner Henry Vance is not. Vance and employee Daniel Grey sign Benton's name to orders for boilers they know to be defective. Their partners in the scheme, which involve installing the boilers in the ship so it will sink at sea and they can collect the insurance, are the agent who carries the ship's insurance and a government inspector. After the ship sinks, the conspirators hire a safecracker to plant money in Benton's safe to make it look like it was he alone who profited from the scheme. Benton is sentenced to prison. He serves 12 years and is released, and when he gets out he finds out what really happened, but the men who were responsible for it are now wealthy and have become powers in city politics. Determined to clear his name, he comes up with a plan to expose the crooks by using their tactics against them.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of Her Beloved Enemy perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

A murderer is driven slowly insane by a sequence of coincidences and suggestive events which will not allow him to escape his own sense of guilt for his crime.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

A pro at the shell game, Jim Blake practices his skills at country fairs, circuses, and carnivals until he becomes "J. Hatfield Blake," the promoter of phony stock and land deals which provide his beloved daughter Margaret with luxuries. Margaret falls in love with Dick Wilbur, who leaves her because Blake swindles his father out of $100,000 and Margaret sides with Blake. When Margaret meets a poor widow with starving babies to whom Blake sold some worthless desert land, she leaves him, saying she will not return until he rectifies his wrongdoings. She marries Dick, while Blake, shaken by her words, repays everyone who suffered from his dishonesty after he legitimately strikes oil. Alone on Christmas Eve, Blake invites some barroom characters to his mansion for a drunken dinner, after which, at his urging, they take his silverware and paintings. Blake continues to drink and when Margaret and Dick arrive to surprise him, they find him dead.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

A visual fragment from the archive: The thematic resonance of The False Code perfectly mirrors the editorial trajectory of our deep dive.

Hillaire Latour, a warmhearted Canadian trapper, marries Rosalie Dufresne and then travels into the woods to seek his fortune as a lumberman. At the camp, he befriends "Spud" Lafferty, who for six years has tried unsuccessfully to return home with his money, each time falling prey to a beautiful woman who works in the saloon "down the hill." When Hillaire learns through a letter that he is a father, he asks for his money and begins the journey home, but on his first night away from camp, he enters the saloon, where he is robbed by the beautiful Louise. Forced to return to the lumber camp, Hillaire saves his money, but the next year he is cheated again. Louise is on the verge of robbing him a third time when Hillaire, in a rage, wrecks the dance hall and forces her to return his money. At the police station, Hillaire is reunited with his family, who have finally come in search of him.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

Although John Lynch owns a ranch, he earns his living gambling in the mining town of El Monte, California. His father Elias, a Virginia gentleman chagrined by his son's gambling, leaves to live outside the town in a cabin with his friend "Twisted" Tuttle. 'Bige Rivers, a road agent who looks like John, abuses his lover Nita, a dance hall girl, who then is cared for by John and his daughter Mary. Rivers and his band rob the midnight stage of gold and kill all the passengers at the same time that John is in the vicinity to visit his father. Rivers and his gang divide the money at Tuttle's cabin where he shoots Elias. Before he dies, Elias accuses John of the shooting. Nita's screams upon discovering Rivers hiding, bring the mob, about to lynch John, too late to save her. John shoots Rivers and is then released.

Dir: Ernest C. Warde

Dr. Primrose, the vicar of Wakefield, enjoys life with his wife and five children. His two daughters, Olivia and Sophia, are courted by two apparent gentlemen, Mr. Burchell and Squire Thornhill, who is Dr. Primrose's landlord. But when Mr. Burchell is supposed to have seduced and abandoned Olivia, the Primrose family finds its fortunes dwindling in every sense. It is learned that Burchell is innocent of the seduction, and the real villain is unmasked, but not before Primrose and his family come very near disaster.